The scene throughout is a sitting room in Mrs Conway’s house, a detached villa in a prosperous suburb of a manufacturing town, Newlingham.

The play works on the level of a universal human tragedy and a powerful portrait of the history of Britain between the Wars. Priestley shows how through a process of complacency and class arrogance Britain allowed itself to decline and collapse between 1919 and 1937 instead of realising the immense creative and humanistic potential of the post Great War generation. Priestley could clearly see the tide of history leading towards another major European conflict as he has his character Ernest comment in 1937 that they are coming to ‘the next war’.